


Beds Are Burning

by Amatara



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: Angst, Episode Tag, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-14
Updated: 2010-07-14
Packaged: 2017-10-10 13:26:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/100274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amatara/pseuds/Amatara
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That evil exists doesn't mean the world is wrong. Cooper and Albert back at the Great Northern, picking up the pieces after Leland's death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beds Are Burning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ingridmatthews](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ingridmatthews/gifts).



> **Author's Note:** Originally written as a sequel to [Wait For You](http://archiveofourown.org/works/99510) by Ingridmatthews.  
> **Disclaimer:** I bow to David Lynch.

They take the stairs, on his insistence. The lift buttons are square and bright and indisputably inviting, but Dale turns his back on them without a thought.

Albert's groan of protest, which is barely that at all, confirms it. A silent ride up in the lift would be counterproductive. To stay in motion is the surest cure right now. Not for himself, of course. For himself, for now, he's done all he needed to and all he could: faced the storm, passed through, and found himself whole at the other side. Conscience clear, grief tucked away for when he can work through it properly. Rituals work both ways, and this one wasn't just for Leland's sake.

Albert, though – Albert's a different matter.

Oh, he can read the symptoms well enough. Albert needs focus, needs to feel in control, and, judging by the way his shoes are dragging on the stairs, is losing that battle fast. For all his façades, Dale has never found Albert a tough book to read. Right now, though, there are masks on top of masks, and none of them is telling the whole story.

Dale waits at the landing, counts Albert's footsteps by the squelch of wet wool. His own suit's a mess, pant legs soaked through and dripping on the carpet. Not that the carpet will be worse for it, per se. There's something about stairwells, especially in public places like these, that he's always found to be revealing. This one's abysmal in the extreme, too-dim lights failing to mask squalid paintwork. Black veins of a luxury haven, and he stops himself before that thought starts to involve Benjamin Horne.

Eight more steps till Albert catches up, but by that time Dale has made up his mind.

Fourth floor – his room, Albert's is one higher up – and he holds the door open without a word. Albert doesn't question, just shoulders past him and into the corridor. Looking winded, Dale thinks. Albert either smokes too much or not nearly enough, depending on how you look at it. At least if it helped, he'd be able to see it as something more than slow suicide; as a remedy, however flawed. It doesn't help, though. Not for longer than a minute, and, judging by the set of Albert's shoulders, this particular minute passed hours ago.

For a second it's all Dale can do not to either kiss the man or tackle him, do whatever he needs to draw him out right here. But the moment passes, and instead he finds himself trailing after Albert to his own room.

Patting his pockets for the key, he locates it between a soaked handkerchief and ditto wallet. He opens the door and steps inside, and it's only when they're in, when he's closed the latch and is peeling off the remnants of his coat, that he sees Albert stop and blink. That, and he's taken that stance again, the stance that means _I shouldn't be here_ or at least _I'm not sure I want to be_, arms crossed in front of his chest like he's caging something in. Or keeping him out. Or, most likely, both.

Dale gives it a moment while he hangs his vest to dry, along with his tie and ruined socks. He had a fresh pair in the car trunk, like he always does, but given the condition of his shoes, it seemed a waste to use it. The floorboards are polished wood, warm under his feet. He revels in the sensation for a few seconds longer, then kneels to crank up the heating.

"How's your ribs?" Albert says, pointedly enough that Dale knows he must have winced in the process. The answer is _well enough to handle_, but of course that's not an answer Albert will want to hear.

"Wet," Dale says, which seems like a good compromise. He unbuttons his shirt to reveal a sopping bandage, which makes Albert's frown deepen. "Not much use in a change of clothes until I get rid of this."

Albert nods. "I'll have a look; poke at that bullet hole while I'm at it." He drifts another few feet away from the door, and now there's only one more step to take, one more step for Dale to close the distance.

Cold cheek finds a soaked shoulder and burrows into it regardless. Dale shivers, but Albert's hands are blessedly dry, warm anchoring weights on either side of his waist. He counts four heartbeats before Albert shifts and untangles – spurred to movement, again, unable to linger. Dale uses the lull to get rid of his shirt, lean into the bathroom and turn on the heating there.

"I warmly recommend the shower, Albert." He keeps his tone neutral, just to be on the safe side. "I don't know if it's providence or simply good plumbing, but I seem to have been blessed with a singularly fine one." And of course Albert would raise his eyebrows at that, dutiful glare of disbelief.

"Unless you own a spare suit collection, I don't think there's a point in my showering here at all," he says. Dryly, but with a hint of rebellion in the voice. Rebellion he must _want_ Dale to hear, because it's too near the surface, almost hiding in plain sight. A sight that, admittedly, Dale doesn't see often, but he'd have to be blind not to know what it means.

"We'll make do," he says, simply, and palms Albert's shirt. A short burst of breath that Dale pretends, conscientiously, not to hear. But no protest follows, and after a moment Albert's hands have joined his on the buttons. The way his own chest unclenches feels curiously like relief.

"Coop?" Shouldering out of the fabric, Albert balls his hands around it, white knuckles turning whiter. He makes a move as if to chuck the shirt to the floor, just lets it drop instead. "What you did in there… What you said–"

"– was as much for myself as it was for Leland," Dale says. A muscle jumps at Albert's throat, and he finds himself reaching to smooth it down with his thumb. "That's what you mean, isn't it? That, given what crimes he's guilty of, we don't owe him anything?"

Albert swallows, hard, against his hand. "I don't know. Yeah. Maybe." Exasperated sigh. "How you fight your demons is none of my business, Coop. As long as you're not fighting Palmer's as well."

The answer is hardly that simple, but Dale nods. "Point taken, Albert. Thank you." Which must have been a strange thing to say, because the noise Albert makes is half frustration, half laughter, a choked hiccup that gets stuck on the way out.

He's about to ask what's so funny, what it is that he missed, except Albert's mouth on his has just made that quite impossible.

The kiss is slow, cautious, palms trailing across his back and cupping his shoulder blades. Dale finds Albert's hip and pulls himself in by it, tips of his fingers tingling like burned. He wasn't that cold, was he? Or perhaps he was, and he's just stopped feeling it. Either way, the warmth is real, which is all that matters in this place, at this time. Groin grazes groin and then there's more warmth, slow waves lapping up his spine until he's humming with it, and someone – he isn't sure who – moans a faint little moan between the space of two breaths.

Albert isn't meeting his eyes, but his hands are moving, slipping across Dale's belt to tug at the buckle. He shivers briefly, convulsively, head dropping onto Dale's shoulder. From there, it's just a twist and turn to spoon him up, soft noise of surprise, and then Albert is propped against the wall and Dale has his arms wrapped around him from behind.

"What do you want, Albert?" he murmurs. He works a hand between his own stomach and the small of Albert's back, palm down, and rubs slowly.

Albert's huff of protest comes out more like a groan. "Right now? Just forgetting sounds goddamn perfect."

Dale nods. "Like this?" Still-damp pants give way just enough for him to slip a hand between fabric and skin. He strokes gently, warm firmness between his fingers, is met by a shudder and a low sigh.

"God. _Yes._" Why Albert would call for divinity when he doesn't even believe in it, Dale will never understand, but the inflection is telling enough.    

"You're sure the bed wouldn't be more comfortable?" He lets his breath ghost against the nape of Albert's neck.

"Comfortable?" Albert's head snaps up. "Let me get this straight – you just had a killer croak in your arms, and you want us to get _comfortable_?" Albert's voice gives out before the acid can turn to poison, but the harm's already done.

Dale keeps absolutely still, waits for Albert's breathing to settle. "I believe in seizing the moment, Albert," he says quietly. "Right now, the one in my arms is you."

Albert gulps and shrugs and hugs the wall closer. "You know I'm not much of a believer, right?"

"You still say 'God' when you come." Risky, but it draws a snort that's not unlike Albert's trademark one, which has to be a good thing.

"Well, bad habits die hard." Short burst of laughter that turns into a strangled curse. "Coop, don't –" It comes out ragged, and Dale frees his hands without a word, anchors them on clammy shoulders. Albert winces, but doesn't shrug him off. "Sorry. Thought I could – _fuck_. I don't know." He takes a breath, shoulders straightening fractionally. "When I close my eyes, all I can see is this Palmer guy, howling."

"I know," Dale says, simply. "I see the same."

If Albert's surprised by that, he doesn't show it. "How do you do it, Cooper?" he mutters. "Those girls, Palmer, how can you –"

"Make love when young women get raped? Sleep when good people are killed in their homes? Albert, you know the answer to that as well as I do." Albert's chin comes up, jerkily, and Dale cups it in both hands. This time there's no protest when he leans in closer, no protest when he starts to thread Albert's fingers through his. "For every act in life, there's a way to do it right and a way to twist it into something evil. That evil exists doesn't mean the world is wrong. Us doing it right is what gives all of this meaning, makes it worth fighting for. You do know that, don't you? If we give up living…"

"I know." Albert's pupils are pools of black in a huge iris, dark and sincere. "Coop –_ damn_. I know, I –" Their hands part at the waist, and this time it's Albert who reaches, makes _him_ shiver first.

There is a rhythm to this – cheek against shoulder, skin against palms, and if any of these hands are his, he couldn't even tell which one. Albert's throat against his forehead, Albert's hips making urgent little thrusts against his grip, and he can't for the world of him understand how, five minutes ago, he could still have been cold when right now, he feels like the world is burning.

He comes, harshly, like a punch in the gut. Doesn't even know if Albert came before or after, until he hears him pant _God_ as if he means it, finds himself wrapped in a tight embrace.

There are lights then, and a shower and blankets. Little things, big things, and though everything's still as wrong as before, in this corner of the universe he can almost forget it.

There's something to be said for staying in motion. But sometimes, just sometimes, it helps to let the light come to you.


End file.
